To Know What's Worth Dying For
by Lala to the power of 2
Summary: Matt was smart enough to know what was really important in life. [traces of mxm]


Warning: Result of Spontanious Fic Generation, so please ignore typos, redundancy, inconsitancies, and OOC-ness. No time for editing- no time for thought! Fanfic, GO!

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Matt is smarter than he looks. Smart enough to be third in line to succeed L, to be sure, but even those who know that about him fail to grasp exactly how smart Matt is. Because when it comes down to it, what he has that Mello and Near and even L himself seem to lack is the knowledge that no one can possibly know everything.

Matt is smart enough to know he's insignificant. Smart enough to know that these evaluations in Wammy's mean nothing, that even if he tries his hardest and gets the top scores he still won't amount to anything. Being the best, in the end, in only a measure of comparison against everyone else.

Matt knows this. He also knows his limits. He never studied more than necessary to pass his tests, and never did any extra credit. Barely even did his homework, actually.

Mello did not know his limits. Or if he did, he failed to accept them. Always studying, always striving to succeed, Mello was ambitious and motivated. Mello was smart. And did everything he could to prove it.

Near didn't know his limits, either. That's why he was always testing them. Always playing his games, solving his puzzles to see if he could, to see how quickly he could do it. Near was curious and determined. And did everything he could to see what he was capable of.

Matt knows his limits. Know that if he were motivated like Mello or curious like Near, he could have beaten them. Would've been the absolute, indisputable 'best'.

But Matt doesn't want to be best. Because it didn't really mean anything. It was all a race, a test to determine who would succeed L, and Matt knew that when it came down to it, he could have been the one chosen.

Matt doesn't want that kind of responsibility, though. He doesn't care for detective work, honestly, and had absolutely no desire to be the world's greatest detective.

So he didn't bother. He'll never know everything there is to know, so there's no point in learning anything more than what he sees as useful or important.

Matt was smart enough not to care. A common problem, in those deemed brilliant. He was the very image of the Lazy Genius; the picture of apathy. And that suited him just fine.

So he laid low. Passed his tests, did enough homework to not get scolded, and sat in the background; hiding strategically in the shadows of Near and Mello.

Because being smart was more trouble than it was worth. In fact, the only real reason he wanted to stay in Wammy's orphanage was because he liked the company. Liked L, liked Watari, liked Roger; all good people, kind people who liked taking in strays and seeing them fulfill the potential that would have otherwise been wasted.

Matt also liked Mello. Mello was everything Matt wasn't, but wanted to be. Mello was devious, commanding, emotional, and motivated. Mello wanted to be the best. Mello wanted to surpass Near. Mello _wanted_.

He was also absolutely out of his fucking mind, and in Matt's opinion that was definitely a good thing. Always kept things interesting.

Mello was smart, and more importantly Mello was a person of action. He acted on impulse, and usually ended up being right regardless of whether or not he thought things through carefully.

Matt liked Mello because he was the only person in Wammy's who was not good at thinking. Because Matt didn't want to have to think, because he didn't care about the results. And when you don't care about what happens, nothing good can come of what one's capable of on their own.

He thinks that when L died, (positive proof that he was right about what happened when you cared,) the right choice was made when both Near and Mello were selected to take over his work. Because Mello and Near complimented each other in an amazing way- the way they thought was so different that if combined the possibilities would have been as close to limitless as anything he knew. Anything one didn't think of the other would instead, and if they cooperated anything they did would be twice as great for having come from both perspectives.

Except that while their minds complimented each other, their personalities just clashed. Horribly. They had all of the wrong things in common, and absolutely nothing else similar. Their partnership was doomed before it began, and Matt knew it would end up that way.

It was too bad he would've made an absolutely disastrous L. If he had any ability to lead, or the patience to pour over information for endless hours in the off chance that he might find something useful in it, or the sense of justice to want to see problems solved on principle, he would've been a fantastic detective, he thinks. And finds himself grateful that he's none of these things, because being L seems like it would be a pain in the ass.

When Near and Mello left, as he had known they would, Matt still had to decide what to do. It didn't take long. He already knew that he shouldn't think it through carefully, so when the thought occurred to him to leave that's exactly what he did. Because if he stayed behind, he'd lose everything he had become so far, lost in a sea of reason with not a bit of chaos to distract him.

Matt admired Mello. He was everything Matt wasn't, but would have liked to have been. He was impulsive, and unreasonable, and quick to act on emotion.

So Matt followed him. Followed Mello's lead. Where he could act without thinking, and still end up in something brilliant.

He remembers when he learned French, a year before they started it in school. When Mello had been corrected by Matt in proper possessive pronouns, Mello had almost gone ballistic. He asked how Matt knew French, how he had figured it out before Mello, and when Matt told him that every part of the language he hadn't learned from watching television and foreign films he had picked up in the one lesson in the subject they had had so far, Mello hadn't spoken to him for three days.

Matt knew what that meant. That meant that Mello felt like he had been beaten, that Matt was superior to him, that Mello wasn't good enough.

Matt had never bested Mello in anything involving studying. Games, races, gambles; those were nothing, but Mello felt as if he had been threatened. As if the one friend he had now needed to be treated like another rival.

Matt redeemed himself by stopping what little schoolwork he had been doing for a while, thus failing three tests (because in Wammy's anything below a C was considered as a total failure, and anything below a B a disappointment). He was scolded, but Mello stopped treating him like a threat after that, so to Matt it was worth the lectures on him not applying himself.

Because Matt liked Mello. Liked the way he thought, liked the way he acted, liked the way he thought of Matt as a friend. To Mello everyone was either a rival or not worth knowing, and Matt was the only one who was neither scum on his shoes or a threat to his existence. Matt was just Matt. Exactly as he wanted to be.

Mello was the only thing Matt had ever put forth effort for. He had made him intentionally get specific results, rather than just coasting like he usually did. Mello was the only thing Matt had ever cared about.

He had felt that he wasn't the only one like that. According to something written by Kurt Vonnegut that Matt had never bother looking up whether or not it was true, Felix Hoenikker had been the same. The man who singlehandedly contributed more to the development of the atom bomb that anyone only worked on it because it seemed like fun. He had nearly let the project go unfinished in favor of researching string, but had come back when the project staff put sea turtles in his lab to play with, so long as he finished the bomb.

Matt thought he could understand that. The fact that one of the most brilliant men of his time would never have accomplished anything if it was left to him. He knew exactly the feeling.

He supposed that the smartest men that have lived were not among the names in the history books. Because the ones who accomplish great things are people with the desire to know, to understand, create- which meant that they didn't already know to begin with.

The smartest men were the ones who didn't have the desire to know, but rather to just live comfortably. The most intelligent ones were the ones content with the fact that they didn't know everything, because it was not possible to comprehend it all.

Matt was that type of person. Apathetic and lazy, because he already knows everything he wants to know.

He decided that even though he didn't want to do anything himself, he still wanted things to happen and didn't like the thought that things might not be accomplished just because he wasn't involved. Brilliance shouldn't be wasted on a person like him. So he trusted it to Mello.

Mello wanted to accomplish things. And Matt wanted to help him. So Matt followed his orders, followed his plans, followed his whims.

Matt decided that Mello was a more valuable person than him. Mello should accomplish everything he wants to. Mello should have everything he wants because Mello will work for it to the point of obsession, and that alone is more than enough reason for him to achieve it.

Mello wanted to be the best. Matt wanted Mello to get what he deserves.

So when Mello told him about their final plan, he went along with it.

He knew they would both die. Mello's real name was already known, and even if it hadn't been their plans called for so little discretion there was no way someone wouldn't catch them. Mello's plan was impossible to achieve. Mello could never have things go the way he wanted.

So, even knowing that it would be so easy to just _not_ follow him, that they would both live if they just stayed inconspicuous, Matt did as Mello wanted. Because Mello would never have been satisfied if he hadn't, because if Mello hadn't taken that final bull rush into chaos he would never have anything he wanted. To be right, to be the best, or anything else.

Matt wanted Mello to get what he wanted, because he deserved anything he worked that hard for.

Matt died for the sake of Mello. Because Mello wanted, and Matt wanted Mello to get what he wanted, even when he never could.

Mello would either get what he wanted or die trying. Matt thought he should give no less for Mello.

He was smart enough to know what was important.


End file.
